Chapter 1 The Apprentice In the beginning was the story. The story was the beginning in which all things took their place. Through his servants, the Story Tellers, the Master passed the story down from generation to generation. The Story Teller put rules in place to guide and maintain the purity of the Story. He ordained those to speak and one to observe. Those ordained to speak did so according to their own temperament, some according to vision, some according to want and some according to imagination. The one ordained to observe was not permitted to intervene or influence, but only observe. In the gathering of the Tellers the Observer held sway, casting the first lot and judging the word. ********** “I, Willemina Kursh, seventeenth generation Teller, do recognize and accept my responsibility in the presence and on behalf of the Black Dragon. I attest the story I have spoken reflects the thoughts of his servants and that I have not altered by addition or deletion.” She stood silent for a moment. Three stones lay in the dirt at the Story Teller’s feet; one each of gold, silver and obsidian. Although each bore the image of a dragon the obsidian stone’s image was within and revealed by the black-purple glow of the volcanic glass encasing it. The image was that of a chaos dragon. A chaos dragon has a long snake like body and is usually portrayed with its own tail in its mouth thus forming a circle. The mystical light flickered and faded leaving the image of the dragon obscured in the dark black glass. There was a great deal of commotion amongst the multitude of people. There was an air of dissatisfaction in the mingling there, almost as if something offensive had been said. It was the last casting of the stones until the next two centuries would come to realization. Many voiced opinions of being cheated. They complained they had no opportunity; an elderly woman stepped forward, momentarily, and stooped by the three stones lying in the dirt. She reverently placed them into the palm of one hand, first the gold, next the silver and finally the black. She closed her hand over them and raised it above her head. The gathering became completely silent. She slowly turned about, looking at the faces gathered around her. Their ages were greatly varied. They were standing and sitting on the ground and on what appeared to be the ruins of an ancient building, yet these objects blended quite naturally into the evening landscape. When she completed one full revolution she brought her hand down in front of her and cleared her throat. “The Black Dragon has spoken its last words. The Telling is complete and final. May you fare well and meet again when this story is complete.” She then held out her hand at arm’s length and dropped the stones. “The dragon will remain silent until then.” The host began to disperse into the night. There was no arguing with the Observer. She was the final authority in the circle. “This isn’t right.” An aging man complained to his neighbour. “What isn’t right, Earl?” The man questioned. “That your team had barely any say? Isn’t that the point of it, randomness?” “Sky, don’t you care even a little? This is a dreadful situation.” Sky turned and stopped. He brushed his long, coppery red hair out of his face. “How many times have we gone through this? Cheer up. It’ll be an adventure!” He encouraged. “Yeah, I know, I know, one to tell the grand kids about.” Earl answered with exhaustion in his voice. He rubbed his face in his hands and pulled his long curly brown hair back behind his head and sighed. “Don’t you remember the last time this happened?” Earl pressed. Sky raised his eyebrows and curled his bottom lip. He shook his head, expecting Earl to explain further. “The Jewish Holocaust, the world wars, Vietnam, Korea, Persian Gulf, not to mention Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and Darfur? ” Earl said with exasperation. Sky continued to stare and shake his head. “Come on, Sky, the twentieth century A.D.” Earl expounded. “Hiroshima ring a bell?” “Twentieth century A.D.? Earl, I can barely remember last week and you want me to go back nearly six hundred years? Are you nuts?” The two continued walking. “Besides, things have changed a lot. There’s not nearly the density of population or anywhere close to the technology there was back then. You worry too much. Let’s just see how it goes and enjoy the ride.” ********** The summer sun was bright in the mid-morning sky when two figures paused to sit by a small stream. The eldest of the two released a sigh of satisfaction as he sat on a large stone and brushed a long tendril of grey hair from his face and beard. He gazed upon his great-great grandson with pride as the boy peered into an old oak, in search of the songbird whose soothing melody filtered through the grove. The boy quickly glanced to the old man and back to the tree. “What kind of bird is that?” The child asked, full of curiosity. “Well Tinne, it sounds like….” But the boy, being very rambunctious, had already tuned his attentions to other things and quickly interrupted. “Tell me a story Grumpy Earl.” His eyes turning away sheepishly as he realized that he had interrupted his last request. For a moment Earl looked upon the small child with a broad smile on his face. “What kind of story would you like to hear today little squirrel?” He inquired while rubbing his hand briskly through Tinne’s shaggy brown hair. “Magic, no, mystery, adventure. I don’t know. You decide.” Tinne replied turning away from the small hole he had begun digging at the base of the old tree. “Well then. Today I will tell a tale that is not a tale, from a time long ago that has not yet come to pass. I will tell you a great fable that may be fake but is not false….” “Grumpy Earl, you always start your stories like that.” The boy insisted impatiently. “Ah, yes. I must be getting old. But, even still, little one, do not all stories fit this beginning?” “What do you mean?” Tinne asked turning his head to one side with earnest intent. “What I mean to say is that anything you believe to be real will be so. Now let’s get on with the story before winter comes and buries us in snow.” Earl leaned over to take a small stone from the soil and began to turn it over in his hand several times. He looked into a nearby field, his eyes searched as if through a great distance of time. “Once upon a time…” “How do you know so many stories, Grumpy Earl?” Tinne interrupted yet again with a curious look on his face. The old man looked down at the small boy sitting in the sand by the creek and smiled. The lines in his face almost audibly spoke the tale of his advanced years. He had a great deal of patience for this child and learned to expect many interruptions. “Well little one, I’ve been around a long time. Over the course of many years you hear a lot of tales. You see many stories and legends taking place and inevitably, you create a lot of myths and stories yourself.” The old man explained. “Can we make a story one day, Grumpy Earl?” The boy asked, filled with enthusiasm. His imagination had begun already to run rampant in his eyes. “Oh, but of course we will. In fact we are at this very moment.” “How can this be a story? We’re just two guys sittin’ around a creek talkin’ about stories.” Tinne protested. “Oh, but everything has a story, Tinne. And everything is a part of an even bigger story. If this tree that I’m leaning against could speak it would tell all of the things it has seen in a hundred years. It may even tell the story of two guys sitting at its feet talking about stories. In fact, you will probably, one day, tell the story of when you sat by a creek with an old fool listening to his stories.” He looked proudly for a few minutes at the second youngest son of his lineage. “In fact, why don’t you tell me a story, first son of my first great grandchild?” The old man said fondly with his chin resting on his hands that were carefully placed in the cup of the antler on the top of his walking stick. “What kind of story, Grumpy Earl?” The man he looked up at looked as old as the large rock on which he sat. “Oh, I don’t know, how about an adventure with plenty of danger.” The old man replied. Tinne gathered himself up and sat down in front of his great, great grandfather. He stared into the trees for a few minutes while thinking of where to begin. The two looked at each other and Earl nodded with a smile and slight wink of his eye. “Once upon a time there was a terrible and nasty dragon. It was black and green with a body like a snake and it had huge wings. It was storming the country-side, burning and smashing villages everywhere it went.” Tinne stomped around in the soft soil by the creek to emphasize his words. “Why was the dragon on such a rampage?” Earl asked. “Because someone stole one of her eggs.” Tinne replied in mid stomp. “Great knights tried to stop the dragon but she was too mean and roasted them with her fire breath.” He continued. “One day she came to a great city where the king and his army marched out to stop her.” Tinne looked up at Earl smiling back at him and lost track of what he was doing for a moment. “Was the King able to defeat the dragon?” Earl coaxed. “The dragon ate the king and the people ran away. The dragon then moved into the empty city and made a home out of it. One day a wizard came with powerful magic words that took away the dragon’s fire, but he wasn’t able to make the dragon leave the city. The dragon stayed in the city for many years until one day a great warrior came to face her. The knight’s name was Sir Ryan. He came with the people the dragon chased away and he also had a magic sword.”A cardinal sang in the tree over head while Tinne thought some more about his tale. “The dragon laughed at the people and roared a mighty roar. ‘I will eat you up’. She said. ‘And pick my teeth with your little sword.’ She stomped so hard the ground shook, but Sir Ryan took his great sword and chopped off her head. And all the people cheered and moved back into their city. The end.” Tinne looked up at Earl with a shy but proud little grin. Earl smiled back. “You make a great little story teller, my boy.” He said. “Will my story come real, Grumpy Earl?” Tinne asked as he picked up a stone to throw in the stream. “Well of course it’s real, little one. When you believe it, it’s real. Besides how can you talk about something that isn’t real?” Earl answered. “No, I mean for real, for real.” Tinne persisted. “Like when you tell a story.”“Oh, well. I don’t know about that. What makes you think my stories become real, anyway?” Earl said leaning back against the tree. “You did.” He said without turning from the stream. “When did I do that?” “When I was dreaming you told me about telling stories with your friends and then I told you the story that I just told you.” Tinne explained. Earl tugged thoughtfully at his long grey beard with a leathery old hand. “You mean to say that you knew I was going to ask you to tell me a story today?” He asked. “An adventure with plenty of danger.” Tinne responded. Earl stroked his beard some more. “Presaging dreams.” He thought to himself. “A sure sign of a Story Teller.” “Okay, my boy. Let me tell you about the Gorchan and the way of the Story Tellers. It’s about time I started training an apprentice and something tells me it’s supposed to be you.” He confided. “What’s a gore can?” Tinne asked. “Not a gore can, my boy, the Gorchan.” Earl pronounced more emphatically, rolling the “R” and catching the “CH” in the back of his throat like a soft “K”. “It is a set of three magic stones that the Story Tellers use for making their stories come true and for deciding who gets to speak next. I should probably start in the beginning.” He said looking down at his new protégé whose mouth was hanging open. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was dropped into the waters of life. The ripples on the pond spread out and all things in all three realms were created. The Word created man and some were given the gift of storytelling. Its purpose was to create the future of life and man. The Word would be spoken by man and the word spoken would also be lived by those who spoke it.” The old man looked at the young boy to make sure he hadn’t completely lost him. “In order to maintain fairness there were rules laid down for the Story Tellers. First there were a certain number of people who were given the gift. Some would speak of positive events, some would speak of negative events and the others would speak according to whim and random fancy. Sometimes they speak according to vision. Sometimes they speak according to their own imagination, but whatever the motivation, it always comes into being. An Observer holds order and guides the Tellers with the Gorchan. They were also given the gift of extremely long life. This would ensure they would understand the effects and consequences of their words, as they were not impervious to the Word. The Story Tellers are required to meet, for the purpose of deciding the future, once every two hundred years. Any one Story Teller may only speak at a maximum of four sessions and is required to find and train his own apprentice to take his place.The Observer leads the meeting and determines who will speak and when by casting the Gorchan into the circle. The three stones are pure gold, pure silver and obsidian.” “What’s impervious?” Tinne asked. “It means that the Story Tellers are affected by the stories just like anyone else.” Earl explained. “What’s obsidian?” Tinne asked. “Obsidian is a black stone that can be seen through. It is actually volcanic glass. This particular stone is very special and the most important of the three. It decides who may speak and when. Without it the stories told are quite inaccurate. It is a small round stone with the image of a chaos dragon concealed within it. Its name is...” Earl suddenly stopped himself as though he had remembered something important. “We’ll call it the Union Stone for now.” He said after a moment’s consideration. “How does a stone decide who gets to talk? Stones can’t talk.” Tinne argued. “If the Union Stone lands closest to the gold, then those who speak of positive events get to speak. If it lands closest to the silver, those who speak of negative events get to speak. The stones are cast after each negative or positive speaker tells his part of the story. Those who speak after random fancy are allowed to speak after each of the others do.” “What do positive and negative mean?” “Positive means things that are good, productive and beneficial for all and negative means things that are not good or only good for a selected few.” Earl explained. “So the positive Story Tellers are the good guys and the negative ones are the bad guys?” “Basically, yes.” Earl Answered. “Are the other guys good or bad?” “The other guys are unknown. They change sides whenever they feel like it.” The old man expounded. “But what if the good guys don’t get a turn?” Tinne asked with great concern. “Hopefully the Unknowns choose to be good then. Otherwise things go very badly for the next two hundred years.” Earl replied gravely. “How long have you been a Story Teller, Grumpy Earl?” Tinne queried after a minute of silence. “My fourth session is near at hand. That’s why I say it’s high time I find an apprentice. I won’t be permitted to speak again.” “Does that mean I’ll get to live forever too?” “We’re not immortal. We can only expect thirty years after our apprentice’s first telling or thirty years after our fourth telling.” He looked at the boy’s wide wondering eyes for a moment. “Don’t be so eager to think of it as a great blessing, my boy. It comes with its fair share of grief and a great deal of responsibility.” Earl cautioned. “I’ve out lived wives, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters and even grand children. Are you alright?” Earl asked while Tinne stared at his feet with his eyes shifting back and forth. “I’m scared.” Tinne said in a small voice.“You don’t have to be afraid, Tinne. The next Telling won’t be for another twenty years or more. You’ll be a pro by then, my boy.” He assured with a hand on his head. Tinne looked up at him with a sideways smile in response to his great-great grandfather’s comfort. “Do you really think I can do it?” Tinne asked. “I know you can.” Earl replied enthusiastically. “In fact I’ve never been so sure of it in more than two hundred years.” Tinne leaned in and hugged Earl’s waist when he stood up. He put his arm around his newfound apprentice for a few minutes. “I bet you can’t hit that stump with a rock from where you’re standing.” Earl challenged, pointing to a rotten stump on the other side of the stream. “I bet I can.” Tinne responded as he picked up a stone and threw it. The two stood throwing and skipping stones for some time until the sun started to go down.